State of The Language
There are currently an estimated 500 speakers in the Southern Basque Country in Spain, approximately 2% of a population of 21,000 Romanis, and another estimated 500 in France. In Spain the remaining fluent speakers are elderly people mostly over the age of 80; some are equally fluent in Spanish, Basque, or Caló. Middle-aged Erromintxela are mostly passive bilinguals, and the youngest speak only Basque or Spanish. In the Northern Basque Country, however, the language is still being passed on to children. The percentage of speakers among Spanish Erromintxela are higher than 2%, as large numbers of Caló-speaking Romanis moved to the Basque Country in the intense period of industrialisation in the 20th century.
Read more about this topic: Erromintxela Language
Famous quotes containing the words state of, state and/or language:
“till disproportion’d sin
Jarr’d against natures chime, and with harsh din
Broke the fair musick that all creatures made
To their great Lord, whose love their motion sway’d
In perfect Diapason, whilst they stood
In first obedience, and their state of good.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)
“I am willing to pledge myself that if the time should ever come that the voluntary agencies of the country together with the local and state governments are unable to find resources with which to prevent hunger and suffering ... I will ask the aid of every resource of the Federal Government.... I have the faith in the American people that such a day will not come.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“We have tried so hard to adulterate our hearts, and have so greatly abused the microscope to study the hideous excrescences and shameful warts which cover them and which we take pleasure in magnifying, that it is impossible for us to speak the language of other men.”
—Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867)